In explanation of urban memory, Italian architect Aldo Rossi says: «The city remembers things through its buildings and preserving old buildings is like keeping memories in the human mind». Radio city cinema, once was one of the most modern and luxurious Iranian cinema, has been an inseparable part of Tehran’s memory for twenty years. The abandonment of the building is meant to erase the city’s memory - what the city is known for - and what has unfortunately become an ordinary occurrence today, will have a long-term impact on the city and its residents.Radio city cinema is the result of the juxtaposition of three factors which make rehabilitating it and transforming it into a dynamic space vital in Tehran. First, its important role in transforming Valiasr Street into a pedestrian axis as the backbone of the city. Secondly, the need to value and preserve urban memory and thirdly, the shortage of active movie theaters in Tehran.
The radio city cinema and all the abandoned buildings in the city are constantly conveying the message of broken windows to residents. A message that «this city has been deserted and ruined from the beginning and that this process will continue to grow». This affects the subconscious and tangibly becomes the norm in the city. Reconstruction of the radio city cinema can be the beginning to end this effect. Butterfly effect that has a negative impact on the mentality of the inhabitants from the appearance of the city.
These three factors imply that the cinema must be revitalized and expanded to the adjacent land. The question now was what kind of building should be built on the ground adjacent to the radio city cinema.
On the other hand, the relationship between the two buildings are generally in four conditions: first that the two buildings are identical, second, that they are in harmony with one another, so they create a common harmony, third, that the two buildings each go their own way. And to be different from each other, and fourth, to have a contradictory relationship.
In the science of logic and among scholars there is a widely used term that many have put forward with their theories; saying that «Things are known by their opposites». This means that in order to understand the darkness we must first know the light and in order to understand the ugliness, we must define the beauty of the proper definition.
Radio city cinema is a rigid object, all-concrete, 100% occupied space. Most of the cinema space is dedicated to movie theaters and the least possible space is dedicated to the lobby and other functions. At the same time, the form of the building is a metaphor of a cube in front of which is an arc. As a result, the adjacent building of the radio city cinema should have an open, transparent, irregular, eccentric and uncertain form and free of any decorations such as arches, etc. Other features that come from analyzing radio city cinema are that it must have a space in front of it (the Plaza) to help in the absence of public spaces in our city.
